


New Coats and New Hats

by enigma731



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: 5+1 Things, Awkwardness, Developing Friendships, F/M, Gen, Hotels
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-17
Updated: 2014-03-17
Packaged: 2018-01-16 00:52:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,851
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1325608
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/enigma731/pseuds/enigma731
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Five times Steve felt awkward sharing a hotel room with Natasha, and one time it wasn’t awkward at all.</p>
            </blockquote>





	New Coats and New Hats

**Author's Note:**

> Many thanks to [andibeth82](http://archiveofourown.org/users/andibeth82/pseuds/andibeth82) for cheerleading, beta, and for allowing this idea to be inspired by [her awesome fic. ](http://archiveofourown.org/works/1312189) Thanks also to [samalander](http://archiveofourown.org/users/samalander/pseuds/samalander) for support and for finding/fixing my hilarious typos.

1.

The prospect of sharing a hotel room with Natasha, it turns out, is far more intimidating than any of the training or assignments Steve has completed for S.H.I.E.L.D. in the six months since New York.

They make it through their first mission together with a tense sort of focus, sticking to protocol and both of them ignoring the feeling that this is all wrong, that the idea of them as partners seems as though it ought to be someone’s joke. They get in and out, though, get the information and Steve doesn’t ask Natasha about the methods she uses because he’s pretty certain he doesn’t want to know.

The awkwardness doesn’t set in until they get to the hotel where they’re overnighting before catching a flight home, until Steve realizes that now there’s nothing to focus on in the next twelve hours now that the mission’s done. Natasha is a ghost moving around the room, silent and even harder to read than she was before leaving New York, if that’s possible. She slips into bed still in her clothes, as though she might be ready to bolt at any moment. 

Steve spends the night staring up at the ceiling, feeling his heartbeat echo through the empty pit of anxiety in his stomach and wondering if _this_ is what the future looks like.

“You didn’t sleep last night,” says Natasha, when it’s morning again and he’s trying to work up any sort of enthusiasm for the bitter brew that comes out of their in-room coffee pot.

He looks at her cautiously over the rim of his mug. “How do you know?”

“I can tell when you’re awake by the sound of your breathing,” she answers, as if that statement isn’t the most unnerving thing he’s ever heard.

“I don’t sleep well very often,” Steve admits, because he supposes there’s no hiding it from her, moving forward.

“You could have said something,” she tells him, and there’s a quiet sort of warmth in her gaze when she meets his eyes, lingering for a moment before disappearing into the bathroom to shower.

2\. 

On their second overnight together, Steve makes the mistake of wandering into the bathroom while she’s brushing her teeth. He freezes immediately, though she hasn’t fully shut the door and doesn’t stop what she’s doing as she meets his eyes in the mirror.

This time she’s changed into plaid pajama pants and a black tanktop, her hair pulled back and her face free of makeup in a way he’s never seen before. There are dark shadows under her eyes, and the delicate spidery white lines of a scar spreading across the skin of her left temple. She looks very young and at the same time, much older than her years, and then beneath that painfully human, that thought punctuated by the smudge of toothpaste on her lower lip. 

“Sorry,” Steve breathes, when he can find his voice. “Didn’t realize you were--occupied.” 

“Did you want to share the sink?” she asks, her tone almost a friendly challenge.

Steve shakes his head and backs away, but he feels as though he’s passed some sort of test just the same.

3.

They’re in Istanbul on their third job together when everything goes wrong, when Natasha loses her cover and Steve narrowly escapes getting blown up when he goes in to help her. He’s beyond exhausted by the time they manage a getaway back to their hotel, and he stumbles straight into the shower.

He doesn’t notice his mistake until after he’s spent a few long blissful minutes letting the hot water wash away the blood and gunpowder that cakes his skin. It isn’t until he steps out and sees the forlorn pile of half-burned fabric that used to be his uniform that he realizes he doesn’t have anything else to put on, that the rest of his clothes are in his bag outside. For a moment he stands there cursing his own carelessness, his face burning in a way that has nothing to do with the steam. Then, sighing, he pulls a towel off the rack and wraps it as securely as he can around his hips.

“I forgot my pajamas out here,” he announces as he emerges from the bathroom, half justification and half nonsensical warning--of what he has absolutely no idea. He _was_ in the army, after all; it isn’t like he’s never been seen in nothing but a towel, but this is Natasha, who makes him feel bare even behind uniform and shield.

She looks up from her book for a moment and raises an eyebrow, looking for all the world like she’s spent the afternoon relaxing rather than coming within an inch of death. “And you’re telling me this--why, because you’re afraid I’ll be overcome by the sight of your bare chest, Rogers?”

“Didn’t want to be inconsiderate,” says Steve, feeling himself flush again as he scoops the necessary clothing out of his bag.

Natasha snorts softly. “Please. I live with a man who’s declared it to be Naked Thursday every week. And sometimes Friday and Saturday, too. I think I’ll manage somehow.”

Steve laughs at that, surprising himself. “Fair point.”

4\. 

“Come help?” Natasha calls around the bathroom door she’s left open just a crack.

Steve stands, considers her request from the far end of the room where he’s been trying his hardest not to hear whatever she’s doing in there, like he always does. “What do you need?”

“Come here and help me,” she repeats, her tone firm but not impatient or unkind, just steady like he’s come to expect.

He decides (as he always does) that he trusts her, cautiously approaching the bathroom. There’s a little residual heat and steam radiating from the open door, along with the distinctive floral scent of hairspray that gives him a sudden pang of nostalgia for his USO days. Natasha is standing in front of the mirror, makeup and curls stunningly immaculate, another part of her unique arsenal. For this job, she’s wearing a cocktail dress that’s skin tight and sapphire blue, and it takes Steve a moment to realize that she’s holding the back closed with her fingers.

“Zip this for me?” she asks, as though she’s been waiting for him to notice and read her request for himself.

“Oh,” he says, swallowing and nodding. “Sure.”

It’s a perfectly simple task, he tells himself, but there’s still something about the act that makes him catch his breath, something in the warmth of her skin under his fingers, the delicate lace at the top of her bra and the barely visible outline he knows is a dagger concealed at her hip - her secrets laid out for him to see if he happens to be looking.

“Why did you ask me to do that?” he says as she turns to face him. The pieces don’t quite fit, he thinks, adding up to just a little more.

“I needed it zipped,” says Natasha. 

Steve frowns a little. “But I’ve seen you move. I’ve seen you stretch. You could have done it yourself if you wanted to.”

She shrugs, smiling faintly. “Maybe I didn’t want to. Maybe I don’t want to get ready for every job alone.”

5\. 

Steve wakes with the sort of uneasy start he’s come to associate with sleeping later than usual, later than he ought to. There’s sunlight spilling in the window, and Natasha’s bed is empty on the other side of the room. He sits up abruptly, heart pounding with the sudden irrational fear that she’s left him here--and stops short.

Natasha is stretched out on the floor in her pajamas, her neck and back arched upward in the elegant lines that Steve recognizes as yoga, but he doesn’t know how to name the pose.

“Hi,” she breathes, rolling gracefully up to sit cross-legged as she faces him. “Good morning.”

She’s smiling despite the bruise darkening on the right side of her jaw, her hair is disheveled, and Steve doesn’t think he’s ever seen her look quite so peaceful before.

He swallows, feeling suddenly as though he’s witnessing a ritual, something both private and precious. “Morning. Do you want me to leave? Or go back to sleep? Don’t let me stop you.”

Her smile widens a little, her eyes bright. “Why don’t you join me?”

“I don’t know how,” says Steve, feeling the familiar tug of anxiety that still accompanies the realization that he’s out of his element. He wants to join her, though, he realizes, wants to share the peculiar serenity he sees reflected on her face.

“That’s okay,” says Natasha, standing and holding out both hands. “I’ll teach you.”

He nods once and lets her pull him up.

“Good call,” says Natasha, her grin turning just a little wicked. “I hear yoga is great for older men. Just the thing to help you stay limber.”

“I liked the silent meditation thing you were doing better,” Steve retorts, and follows her into the first stretch.

\+ 1

They make it four months before someone at S.H.I.E.L.D. fumbles the reservation and they end up with one bed and an overbooked hotel. It’s probably lucky they’ve avoided this situation as long as they have, but that doesn’t stop the knot of dread from tightening his stomach the minute they enter the room.

“I’ll take the floor,” he says immediately, his heart in his throat.

Natasha shakes her head as she ditches her bag next to an overstuffed gray chair. “Not happening.”

Steve sighs. “Call me old-fashioned, Nat, but a guy shouldn’t make a woman sleep on the floor.”

She rolls her eyes. “Neither of us is sleeping on the floor, Rogers. Now, go put your pajamas on.”

He can’t muster the energy to argue, not after the job they’ve just finished and not when the familiar loneliness is gnawing at the back of his throat, making the idea of sharing a bed seem dangerously enticing. Instead he does as instructed, and when he comes back out she’s already curled up under the blankets, watching him.

Steve keeps his body as far away from hers as possible as he climbs in, turns out the light in a futile effort to hide his discomfort.

“Sometimes I have nightmares,” he tells the ceiling, when the silence is unbearable and he’s feeling an overwhelming need to apologize for all the human parts of himself.

He feels the blanket shift a little as she shrugs. “Sometimes I kick.” 

“Should I be worried?” asks Steve, though he isn’t really. 

“Probably,” says Natasha, theatrically. “I’d hate to beat up an old man.”

Steve scoffs, feeling some of the tension drain away. “Don’t make me tell Barton that I’m your new favorite punching bag.”

She laughs. “Good night, Steve. We can compare bruises in the morning.” 

Natasha rolls to the side, taking some of the blankets with her and letting him know the conversation is over. Steve falls asleep with a smile on his lips and the warmth of her body at his back.


End file.
